I grew up in the 1950’s so to me Paul Winchell was the man. I loved to sit in front of the TV and watch his show and dream of being in the audience. His shows always had such a variety of entertainment not only with guest singers or actors but even the commercials were entertaining. Then of course those great characters Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff. Boy those characters were great and for me, and most of the kids, they were really alive. A good reason for this is that Paul decided to have those characters animated. Even though he gave them their voices and did manipulate the head stick, the arms moved just like mine and yours. This really brought them to life. We can credit this to Mr Jay Lloyd. He was the person who was behind the scenes and worked the arms.
Mr Steve Meltzer from California, a wonderful puppeteer in his own right, sent in these wonderful pictures of Jay Lloyd with Tessie, plus some recent pictures with Jerry from behind the scenes.
Thanks Steve for letting us all see these very rare pictures of one of the reasons that made Jerry such a smash hit in the early days of television.
Click here to check out Steve Meltzer’s website
Dan
www.ventriloquistcentral.com
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